Music from the heart

MSO features one of its own

MSO features one of its own

February 14, 2008|By KATE COLEMAN

Music Director Elizabeth Schulze is looking forward to the Maryland Symphony Orchestra's collaboration with "one of its own" this weekend.

Principal oboist Fatma Daglar will be featured in the MSO's performance of Richard Strauss' Oboe Concerto in D major, a work Schulze called a "tour de force concerto that calls for enormous stamina as well as intense technical control and musical focus."

Daglar, 35, acknowledged the concerto likely is considered the most difficult in the oboe repertoire. She called it beautiful and melodic. "It's a crowd-pleaser, too," she said.

She also will be playing the second half of the program, something guest artists don't typically do. She couldn't resist Robert Schumann's Symphony No. 2.

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"Oh, it's a beautiful piece with a beautiful oboe solo and I had to play it," she said.

That "had to play it" quality is characteristic of music's appeal to Daglar. As a teenager in Istanbul, Turkey, Daglar saw "Amadeus," the film about Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and "immediately fell in love." She'd come home from school and put in the videotape, and knew then that she wanted to take lessons and be involved with classical music.

Never having played an instrument, she applied to the local music school and was told she had a "really good ear." At 14, she was a year older than the cutoff age for cello, her first choice. Her options were a woodwind or brass instrument, and she chose the oboe.

Daglar said she's glad she did, but doesn't recommend that kids take up the instrument. It is difficult because players have to constantly adjust the reed - the thin strip of bamboo cane placed against the mouthpiece.

"But," she added, "for those who decide that the oboe is their instrument, then they just have to go with what's in their heart - like I did."

Daglar's heart and her oboe brought her to the United States in 1993. She was offered a full scholarship and earned master's and graduate performance degrees from Peabody Conservatory of Music.

She now teaches in Peabody's Preparatory program and at St. Mary's College of Maryland. She has several private students as well. She enjoys teaching and finds it rewarding. "I just love to witness that I'm actually making a change," she said.

Daglar also is principal oboist with the Annapolis Symphony Orchestra and plays with Concert Artists of Baltimore. She has performed with numerous chamber groups and orchestras, and played at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center with Arlo Guthrie in symphonic adaptations of his music.

This weekend will be exhausting, Daglar admitted, but she's looking forward to the performances. MSO musicians always feel so welcome in Hagerstown, she said. "We just get treated so nicely, and we all very, very much appreciate that."

COST: Tickets cost $21 to $48 for adults, and $11 to $24 reserved for students. They are available by calling 301-797-4000 or going to the MSO box office, 30 W. Washington St. in Hagerstown. Box office hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays and noon to 4 p.m. Saturday. Tickets will be available at The Maryland Theatre from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Saturday and 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. Sunday.

NEW: Student rush tickets are available for $5 at The Maryland Theatre box office 90 minutes before each performance.

MORE: Music Director and Conductor Elizabeth Schulze will talk about the program's music and composers one hour before Saturday and Sunday's performances during Prelude. The half-hour presentation is free for ticket holders. For information and to listen to selections from the weekend program, go to the MSO Web site at www.marylandsymphony.org.